Who Was that Masked Woman? Representations of Women Vigilantes and Outlaws in Popular Media from Reconstruction to the Great Depression

We are looking for two chapters to complete a manuscript currently in development with a publisher.  We invite chapter proposals for a collection of critical essays that examine how women vigilantes, anti-heroines, and outlaws were represented in movie serials, radio dramas, films, comics, and pulp fiction in America at the turn of the century.  

As this will be a multidisciplinary collection, we encourage submissions from scholars in any of the numerous fields that examine the representation of women in American popular culture from 1865-1940. The call is open to a broad spectrum of methodological and critical approaches, and we invite submissions from seasoned as well as emerging scholars.  

We encourage proposals that consider how representations of women intersect with matters of class, race, ethnicity, sexuality, and the gendered mores of mass culture.

We especially welcome submissions that examine lesser-known figures, though a well-written chapter on a character like Wonder Woman would be considered. Chapters may also examine historical figures, such as Calamity Jane, but the analysis should focus on their representation in popular media, rather than their biography.

Please send abstracts of 500-750 words by July 15th to: brayg@newpaltz.edu

Authors of accepted proposals will be notified on August 1st. Full chapter manuscripts will be due October 1st. The full book manuscript will be ready for publishers by the end of 2022. 

About the editors:  Gregory Bray, PhD, is an Associate Professor in Digital Media and Journalism at SUNY New Paltz. He serves on the editorial board for The Journal of Popular Culture and has previously served on the Board of Directors at the Broadcast Education Association. His work has been published through The Journal of Popular Culture, McFarland Press, and Atropos Press.   

Andrew Ball, PhD, specializes in 19th and 20th century American culture. He is the author of The Economy of Religion in American Literature: Culture and the Politics of Redemption (Bloomsbury 2022). His scholarship has appeared in American Literary Realism, Studies in American Fiction, and Philosophy and Literature, among other publications. He is the Editor of Screen Bodies: The Journal of Embodiment, Media Arts, and Technology and serves as Editorial Assistant in Harvard University’s Department of Mathematics.